One day, late in the fall, when the strain upon her heart had become too great, she broke the fetters. It was at dusk, and, coming around the corner of the cottage, she found him sitting on the doorstep, his gaze far away, his dejection showing in the droop of the broad shoulders. A little gasp of pain came from her lips—pain mingled with love and pity for him. She stood for a moment, reading his thoughts as if they were printed before her eyes—thoughts of fame, honor, success, trial, chance! How good, how handsome, how noble he was! She was the weight, the drag! The hour had come for her to decide. He would never say the word—that much she knew.
"Jud," she said, standing bravely before him. He looked up, shaking off his dream. "Don't you think it about time you were trying your luck in Chicago? You surely have worked hard enough at your drawing, and I don't see why you put it off any longer."
For a moment he was unable to speak. Into his eyes came a blur of tears.
"But, Justine, dear, how are we to live there? They say it takes a fortune," he said. There was a breath of eagerness in his voice and she detected it.
She sat beside him and laid her arm about his shoulder. He turned his face to hers, wondering, and their eyes met. For a long time neither spoke by tongue, but they understood. A sob came into his throat as he lifted her hand from her lap and drew her to him almost convulsively.
"Justine, I can't do that! I can't go away off there and leave you here alone. Why, sweetheart, I'd die without you," he cried.
"But when you are able, dear, to take me to you in the great city, we can be the happiest people in the world," she said huskily. "I'll be lonesome and you'll be lonesome, but it won't be for long. You will succeed. I know it, dear, and you must not waste another day in this wilderness——"
"It is the sweetest place in the world," he cried, passionately. "Wilderness? With you here beside me? Oh, Justine, it will be wilderness if I go away from you!"
"Surely, surely, Jud, it is for the best. I know you can't take me now, but you can come after me some day, and then I'll know that I have lost nothing by letting you go. You will be a great—you will succeed! Why, Jud, you draw better than any one I ever knew about. Your pictures even now are better than any I have ever seen. They can't help liking you in Chicago. You must go—you must, Jud!" She was talking rapidly, excitedly.
"You love me so much that you are blind, dear. Up in Chicago they have thousands of artists who are better than I am, and they are starving. Wait a minute! Suppose I should fail! Suppose they should laugh at me and I couldn't get work. What then? I have no money, no friends up there. If I don't get on, what is to become of me? Did you ever think of that?"